


as the days go by

by eclairs



Category: Wanna One (Band)
Genre: M/M, angsty, based on letting go by day6
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-30
Updated: 2017-10-30
Packaged: 2019-01-26 19:48:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,987
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12564864
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eclairs/pseuds/eclairs
Summary: Really, Minhyun has never been good with goodbyes. He hadn’t wanted to say it the first time; it had felt like leaving his brothers, the family he had grown to love over the course of six arduous years. Back then, the idea of disbandment had seemed like a release, something that would be tinged with the promise of a new beginning alongside the muted filters of sadness. Yet now, disbandment feels more like the beginning of an end.





	as the days go by

**Author's Note:**

> co-written by booguanlin and memejisung on twitter! i (memejisung) did the last half of it, from "pain is only temporary" onwards while eden (booguanlin) did the first half :)! beta-ed by me

The cup of tea placed between the palms of his hands is the only sense of warmth that Minhyun possesses in cold December morning as he watches a shirtless Daniel and a very competitive Seongwoo play The Musician in couple mode. The sight, in addition to every other little or big thing that he’s noticed, has his blood running colder than the snowfall. He, Daniel, Seongwoo, and Jisung share the living room and kitchen together as the essences of the breakfast that Jisung is cooking circulates throughout the room.

Opting to retreat into the kitchen rather than third-wheel his boyfriend and the best friend, Minhyun leans against the counter and watches Jisung. “What’s for breakfast?” he asks– anything to break the silence and ease his mind.

“Are you getting jealous over Seongwoo and Daniel again?” Jisung counters instead, completely ignoring Minhyun’s question because he should _clearly_ be able to see that Jisung’s cooking kimchi fried rice.

Minhyun responds with silence, and Jisung doesn’t know how to tell him that Daniel crawled into Seongwoo’s open arms in the depths of the night.

“I’ll wake the others up,” Minhyun says, but Jisung stops him because they had a late night last night and they need their rest. Minhyun ends up sharing the kitchen table with the other three. Daniel and Seongwoo do a poor job of hiding their game of footsie even as the latter sits adjacent to Minhyun, and when Jisung glares at them, Seongwoo smiles cheekily. He doesn’t sense the tension of the situation on his boyfriend’s part, at least, not until Minhyun untangles his fingers from Seongwoo’s. And Seongwoo doesn’t seem to mind. The dinner continues silently, with Minhyun’s eyes glued to the plate, Daniel and Seongwoo’s eyes occasionally meeting in mischievous glances.

Minhyun and Seongwoo have always been a secret, just like Ongniel has always been science. He guesses that their more-than-platonic interactions were too much to make it onto the camera, so they learned. They learned to hide their smiles while gazing at each other, they learned to keep their hands off each other, they learned to distract themselves from each other.

And it worked. Fans never found out. From episodes of Wanna One Go to the last two weeks before their disbandment, Onghwang hadn’t acquired more attention than for their Visual Bermuda Triangle trio with Guanlin. Minhyun would be lying if he said he wasn’t jealous of the pairings for Wanna One Go, and he’d be lying if he said he wasn’t jealous when Ongniel were recruited as permanent cast members for Master Key without him. Despite the family that Minhyun and Seongwoo have practically formed around the maknae line, despite the nights and mornings they spent cuddled on Seongwoo’s bed, despite the midnight escapades they’d always take on when the streets of Seoul were quiet and there were a smaller amount of cameras out watching, it was never Minhyun and Seongwoo. It was always Ongniel.

And sometimes, even with the risks of gay dating scandals, Minhyun wishes that Onghwang existed too.

 

_The bright future we sought together,_

_I know we can no longer_

_wish for a happy ending._

 

 The days nearing disbandment are halved between loud preparations for the final concert and somber packing days at the dormitory. Occasionally, Jihoon and Woojin’s bickering fills the cracks and crevices of the silence in the room before Guanlin separates them (sometimes physically with a tall and lanky body), but more often than not, the silence is faintly occupied by distinct laughter in the room on the other side of the dorm - Daniel’s husky laughter in response to Seongwoo’s jokes.

As disbandment creeps even nearer, the dance studio is always being used by them. The flower boy empties his water bottle in stressed sips and stands to throw it away and retrieve a new one, but instead, Seongwoo arrives with his reusable water bottle and offers it to Minhyun. “I thought Mr. Clean would be promoting reusable water bottles over non-degradable plastic water bottles,” the aforementioned says with a simper on his lips. Minhyun smiles and takes Seongwoo’s water bottle out of politeness, even if he’s suddenly not thirsty anymore.

“I can’t find mine at home. I think I already packed it,” Minhyun replies, sudden realization dawning that in ten days, that won’t be his home anymore.

Seongwoo quirks a brow. “My boyfriend, Hwang Minhyun, misplacing something? Impossible.” Minhyun’s chest tightens when he picks up the words ‘my boyfriend’– Seongwoo’s claim that Minhyun is his, and the claim is of no error. “What’s on your mind?”

What’s truly on Minhyun’s mind is that he wishes Seongwoo was his too, because he is wholly Seongwoo’s, but instead, Minhyun smiles. “Nothing at all, babe. Get to practice.”

Seongwoo returns the smile and places a brief peck on Minhyun’s lips before heading out. As always, Daniel waits for him, and they walk towards their practice together. Jisung appears in front of Minhyun with an understanding smile on his face, holding out his hand to help the younger up.

As the days count down towards their disbandment, Minhyun’s decision becomes clearer and clearer.

 

* * *

 

  _Pain is only temporary, someday you will meet_

_someone who can make you happier._

_That’s the kind of love you deserve,_

_I got to say good bye right now_

 

Minhyun’s folding his clothes, smoothing out the creases like he always does, but somehow this time it’s not the same. 

His battered grey suitcase lies beside him, open and waiting. Minhyun knows he ought to finish packing soon; even with Aron bawling his eyes out and Minki going through at least five outfits before settling on one, the company car will likely arrive in less than an hour, and he really shouldn’t keep their manager waiting.

Still. Minhyun knows this, but he’s also been folding the same shirt for the past twenty minutes, his hands moving as if on autopilot. It’s not a difficult task to move the shirt from the floor and into his suitcase, but to Minhyun it feels like the hardest task of all. Every item he fills up the suitcase with only serves to drive in how empty the room has become, without the familiar trinkets and boisterous laughter that have long since become a daily fixture in Minhyun’s life. It had seemed like a dream, even as he’d crossed off the days on his calendar, even as the disbandment articles sprung up one after another from every news outlet in the nation, even as he’d been faced with a sea of crying fans at their final concert, tears pooling behind his own lashes. And now it’s finally sinking in, weighing his heart down a little more with each second that passes by, each crease in the fabric that he smoothes out and folds back again.

Really, Minhyun has never been good with goodbyes. He hadn’t wanted to say it the first time; it had felt like leaving his brothers, the family he had grown to love over the course of six arduous years. Back then, the idea of disbandment had seemed like a release, something that would be tinged with the promise of a new beginning alongside the muted filters of sadness. Yet now, disbandment feels more like the beginning of an end.

Minhyun gets jolted out from his own thoughts as Seongwoo’s hands close over the shirt Minhyun is holding, and eases it out of his hands, gently slotting the shirt into Minhyun’s suitcase, then zipping it shut.

“Oh, you’re here,” Minhyun says as he looks up at Seongwoo. Seongwoo blinks a few times, then starts speaking slowly, as if Minhyun doesn’t understand Korean. “I… live here, and the company van hasn’t come to pick me up yet, so yes, I’m here.”

There’s a comfortable silence, as Seongwoo smiles gently at his own sarcasm, revelling in his own sense of humour, as he always does. Minhyun wants to stop time, cherish the last moments of what has grown to be familiar to him over the past year and a half. This is familiarity, this dorm, what he has with Seongwoo, and the way Seongwoo grabs his hand and sinks down onto the bed beside him. But Minhyun knows he’ll be going back to something possibly even more familiar, so why does it feel so jarring?

“So, what’s the cause of our dear Minhyun compulsively folding clothes?”

Minhyun doesn’t know how to respond, how to express the feelings that have been slowly but surely growing in him. So he doesn’t. He chooses to gaze at Seongwoo, map out his every feature just one more time, as if he hasn’t already done so multiple times. “What do you think you’ll do once you get back to Fantagio?”

“I don’t know, maybe I’ll act, maybe they’ll let me debut in a new group,” Seongwoo says, trying to act as if he doesn’t care. His eyes tell Minhyun otherwise, and Minhyun wonders how he has caught on to all the nuances in Seongwoo’s emotions, how his acting can fool everyone, but never Minhyun.

“I’ll be going back to NU’EST, I think we’ll be having a comeback and I’ll be...busy,” Minhyun says carefully, averting his gaze and hoping Seongwoo hears the words he doesn’t have the courage to say.

Seongwoo falls silent for a long moment, trying to process the meaning behind Minhyun’s words, wondering if he’s overthinking. But the way Minhyun is constantly blinking tells him that he isn’t; Seongwoo knows Minhyun’s nervous tics, and the way he blinks tells him that there’s more to it than he’s letting on.

Then it clicks, and suddenly Minhyun’s pensive gaze seems that much sadder. Seongwoo draws in a sharp breath, then realises he doesn’t know what to say. He’s never been good with words; that’s always been Minhyun, with his sincere eloquence and empathetic heart. Seongwoo knows he has to say something, but as usual he finds himself scrambling for the right words to say.

He doesn’t have to, because Minhyun speaks up before he can. “You’ll be fine,” he says, a rueful smile playing on his lips, “you have your best friend, anyway. You’ll forget about me in no time.”

It takes a while for the full implication of Minhyun’s words to sink in. When it finally does, Seongwoo feels like he’s been doused with ice-cold water, the realisation chillingly sobering.

“You...you don’t mean Daniel, do you?” Seongwoo asks, cautiously.

Minhyun doesn’t know how to answer at all, his usual way with words failing him as he tries to put everything into a coherent sentence. It’s neither this nor that, and everything and anything seems to be coming together to tell him just one thing - that he can’t keep Seongwoo with him anymore. He knows the answer is yes, but he also knows that he has a million other things to say. Time is ticking, and Minhyun cannot seem to give Seongwoo the answer, the closure, he deserves.

He doesn’t have to, because Seongwoo’s phone vibrates with a text, popping the surreal bubble Minhyun feels like he’s been living in for the past year and a half. The van has arrived, bringing with it the finality that Minhyun has been dreading. Seongwoo stands up, and is halfway through the doorway when Minhyun stops him, turning him around. Seongwoo looks bewildered for a second, and Minhyun says something he knows he might regret.

“Can I kiss you?”

It feels just like the first time, blushing cheeks and fingers intertwining tentatively, as if afraid to shatter the delicate fragility of the moment. It’s the same, and yet so very different, because where there was a languid calm before, every movement now feels harried and desperate, tinged with the knowledge that there will never be a second time.

 

_Holding on to you will do you no good._

_The times we had together, our dear memories–_

_I let go, let go, let go,_

_so you can smile someday._

**Author's Note:**

> please do comment! eden (who wrote the first half) and i (who wrote the second half) would love to hear your feedback.


End file.
